The Excitement Mounts: “Tales for Canterbury” Goes To Press
One thing that happened in the early part of this week is that I completed the final proof of The Fountain, the short story that I donated to the Tales for Canterbury anthology, a fundraising project for the Christchurch earthquake recovery effort put together by Cassie Hart of SpecFicNZ and Anna Caro of Random Static—all kudos to both of them.
As a resident of Christchurch I am obviously very much in support—no surprises, you may say, that I am willing to put a story out there. What has been really gratifying though, has been the level of both national (extra-Christchurch) and international support.
National authors include Phillipa Ballantine, Karen Healey, Tim Jones, Ripley Patton, & Mary Victoria, to name just a very few.
International authors include Neil Gaiman, Gwyneth Jones, Jay Lake, Juliet Marillier and Sean Williams (again, to name just a few.)
Tales for Canterbury is: “loosely themed around survival, hope and the future.” Given the lineup of both national and international writers I can only imagine that it’s going to be an “absolutely fabulous 😉 ” anthology.
And yesterday editor Anna Caro emailed me that: ” … the book is at the printers!” (“Woot!” I added, not to be undone.)
Honestly though, this is a great moment and a great cause with “all profits … [of this anthology] … being donated to the Red Cross Christchurch Earthquake Appeal.”
The Tales for Canterbury project target is to raise $5000 for the earthquake appeal fund—and so far $1855 has been raised. A great way to help the cause is to preorder your copy—& maybe (no pressure!) a few extra as gifts. And it’s really easy to preorder: all you have to do is go to the Random Static website here.
The other really great thing that you can do is to spread the word—I think it would be fantastic if Tales for Canterbury went viral!
I hope you will consider doing both or either, (& with bells on) because as I know I’ve said before: I think it’s going to be a great anthology—and it’s already a very worthy cause.
Isn’t it exciting? I can’t wait to get my copy 😀 It would be so great if this went viral, for sure. Goodness knows Christchurch needs all the help available.
I’m all happy now for Karen Healey – best YA at Aurealis! Woot, the Kiwi contingent!
I was thrilled when that news came through, too—Guardian of the Dead is a great read. I was also delighted for fellow Supernatural Undergrounder Tansy Rayner Roberts whose Power & Majesty won the award for Best Fantasy Novel and fellow Orbiteer, Marianne de Pierre’s whose Transformation Space took out Best Science Fiction Novel.:)
Heh heh btw I have my author copy of ToC in hand and am looking forward to discovering its contents at my leisure. (Amanda Fitzwater’s ‘My Dad the Tuatara’ is already making me laugh…) I’m looking forward to reading your story!
I had the requisite moment of authorly cringe on re-reading my own, of course, and wanted to re-edit the entire thing. The day I look at a recently published story and am actually halfway happy with it, I’ll know aliens have taken over my brain.
I am waiting for my hard copy versions before I dip in. (Ok, I know: I’ve donated money through my launch-a-thon, I’ve donated the story and now I’m donating again by buying a ‘real’ copy of the anthology; it’s alright, I know, I’m a mug—but then again, it’s my town so I can be a mug about it if I want to.) The fact is, I ‘just-don’t-like’ reading on screen. To me it’s work and ‘just-not-real’ as a reading experience (and it pings the RSI like crazy with all that scrolling down.) But then I will read every story through, for sure.
And y’know, when you read your own story, maybe just make sure that all sources of pen and paper have been removed form the room so you ‘can-not-edit.’ If it’s important enough for you to make a mental note and you can still remember it at the end–well, then by all means get up and grab that pen! But in the meantime, take a moment, smell the roses: enjoy!
Sage advice. And I do enjoy, at the same time as obsessing
And see, see, see: I keep repeating myself in your comments section. ‘Looking forward’ this time. *editor wail*
Maybe it would help if I stopped writing comments at 11pm. Goodnight, fair Helen
Good night, Mary. (You know you worry too much: it’s just a blog comment. 😉 )
I am the Obsessive One. Just call me OO 😉
OO-kay, then …:)